W2RC – New-look 47th Dakar Rally set to kick-start fourth W2RC season

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia performs host to the Dakar Rally for the sixth time from January Third-Nineteenth. Fifty registered FIA World Rally-Raid Championship (W2RC) contenders spearhead an enormous entry on what guarantees to be probably the most troublesome ever Dakar rallies and the fourth to be the opening spherical of the W2RC.

Beginning with a Prologue stage close to Bisha on January Third, opponents will sort out 12 gruelling desert levels that incorporate 5,145 aggressive kilometres in a punishing route of seven,753km.

Toyota Gazoo Racing are the defending W2RC Producers’ champions however face the may of Dacia and the Ford M-Sport groups on this event with X-raid Mini concentrating on the Drivers’ Championship. BBR Motorsport (Taurus), the G Rally Workforce and X-Raid will battle it out for honours within the Challenger class and the Can-Am Manufacturing unit Workforce faces competitors from Polaris within the SSV class.

Three Dacia Sandriders, 4 Ford Raptors and X-Raid Minis and 7 Toyota Hiluxes high the checklist of 24 entrants eligible for the Final W2RC class with MD Optimus and Century Racing additionally within the combine.

Nasser Saleh Al-Attiyah is a five-time winner of the occasion and the defending W2RC champion. He and co-driver Edouard Boulanger made the change to the brand new Dacia Sandrider in the direction of the top of 2024 and the Qatari clinched a 3rd successive title – and a primary with Boulanger – with victory on the Rally of Morocco on the automobile’s debut.

9-time WRC champion Sébastien Loeb has but to fulfil his ambition of successful the occasion and drives a second automobile with Cristina Gutiérrez driving the third automobile. Loeb and navigator Fabian Lurquin completed second to Al-Attiyah in Morocco final October.

Defending the W2RC Producers’ title for a fourth time could possibly be much more difficult for Toyota Gazoo Racing on this event. Yazeed Al-Rajhi completed because the runner-up to Al-Attiyah in 2023 and 2024 and is joined by Brazilian Lucas Moraes and American former Challenger champion Seth Quintero to spearhead the Japanese producer’s problem with the newest model of the Toyota Hilux. The trio proceed to staff up with their common navigators, Timo Gottschalk, Armand Monleón and Dennis Zenz.

Fantastic tuning and ongoing work has been carried out with the Toyota’s suspension in latest weeks and Al-Rajhi clinched an emphatic win in Jeddah shortly earlier than Christmas within the closing shakedown of the automobile earlier than Dakar. Overdrive Racing’s Juan Cruz Yacopini and Rokas Baciuška are additionally registered for the Drivers’ Championship. The latter triumphed within the SSV class in 2022 and 2023 and stepped up for extra success in Challenger final yr.

Toyota Gazoo Racing additionally fields a DKR Hilux for Henk Lategan and a Hilux IMT Evo for Saood Variawa. Veteran South African Giniel de Villiers gained the occasion outright with Volkswagen in 2009 and can be entered in an IMT Evo, however shouldn’t be registered for the W2RC.

The X-Raid Mini JCW Workforce loved a profitable 2024 marketing campaign throughout a variety of Bajas and has a powerful line-up to problem for honours in 2025. Workforce principal Sven Quandt was a significant a part of Workforce Audi Sport’s Dakar success in 2024 and has labored on the event of a petroleum engine for the Mini JCW Rally this yr.

Guillaume de Mévius (second general in 2024) and Denis Krotov will drive the 2 petrol-engined Minis, whereas the FIA World and European Baja Cup champion João Ferreira and Frenchman Lionel Baud will persevere with the diesel engine. Guerlain Chicherit might properly problem for general honours in a 3rd petrol machine however shouldn’t be personally registered for the W2RC.

The Ford M-Sport Workforce have developed the Ranger after which the Raptor away from the highlight of the W2RC for a lot of 2023 and 2024. However the staff has registered for the 2025 W2RC and shall be difficult for each the Producers’ and Drivers’ Championships.

Carlos Sainz is a four-time occasion winner and the defending champion after his memorable success final January with Workforce Audi Sport. He once more groups up with Lucas Cruz and shall be joined by former Audi team-mates Mattias Ekström/Emil Bergkvist and Mitch Guthrie/Dennis Zenz within the three automobiles registered for Producers’ factors. Guthrie makes the step up from the Challenger class.

Joan ‘Nani’ Roma has gained the Dakar on two wheels and in a automobile and crews the fourth Raptor with fellow Spaniard Alex Haro. He carried out a lot of the check and improvement work over latest months and tackled choose occasions final yr, together with topping the instances on the Hungarian Baja in August.

Different W2RC registered drivers prone to push for the highest 10 embody Mathieu Serradori (Century CR-7) and Martin Prokop (Ford Raptor).

Overdrive Racing can be working a Toyota for former Dakar motorbike winners Toby Worth and Sam Sunderland. Australian Worth will drive with Briton Sunderland navigating on their first actual style of four-wheel competitors, however they aren’t registered for the W2RC.

To make the competitors as honest as potential within the flagship Final class, a sequence of proposals have been authorized within the FIA Cross-Nation Rally Sporting Rules to finalise the deployment of the FIA torque meter for the primary time in 2025.

This would be the main system for monitoring and controlling powertrain efficiency in Final group automobiles. Sporting penalties of 10 seconds per infringement shall be imposed for as much as 5, 30 seconds for six to 10 or a hard and fast penalty of 10 minutes per stage for greater than 10 infringements.

The Cross-Nation Rally Fee carried out an evaluation in 2024 and has restructured the points-scoring system. For the Dakar, the factors scale of fifty, 40, 30, 26, 23, 20, 17, 13, 11, 9, 7, 6, 5 and 4 is in situ and the occasion will even see 4 factors awarded for categorized opponents from sixteenth place onwards and two factors awarded to unclassified opponents.

Workforce BBR, the G Rally Workforce and X-Raid set for Challenger battle

With Can-Am switching its consideration to the SSV class from the beginning of 2025, Workforce BBR, the G Rally Workforce and X-raid-built Yamaha YXZs begin because the favourites to tussle for honours within the Challenger class.

Sixteen crews have registered for the W2RC and the defending SSV champion Yasir Seaidan of Saudi Arabia switches to Workforce BBR and leads the best way together with his French navigator Michael Metge within the first of a dozen Taurus T3 Max machines registered for the category.

Argentina’s Nicolas Cavigliasso, the latest FIA Center East Baja Cup winner Dania Akeel and the proficient Spaniard Pau Navarro shall be aiming for the highest spot on the rostrum. Cavigliasso once more groups up with the defending Challenger champion navigator Valentina Pertegarini.

Nasser Racing fields a Taurus for the FIA World Baja Cup’s Challenger champion Edouard Pons, whereas Qatar’s QMMF Workforce has entered a few T3s for Al-Attiyah’s brother Khalifa Saleh Al-Attiyah and the 2024 FIA Center East rally champion Abdulaziz Al-Kuwari.

Argentina’s David Zille, final yr’s Jordan Baja winner Khalid Al-Jafla, Portugal’s Gonçalo Guerreiro, American Corbin Leaverton and Pole Adam Kus full the line-up of registered Taurus drivers. Each Guerreiro and Leaverton shall be hoping to comply with within the footsteps of the likes of Quintero and Guthrie, as they characterize the Pink Bull Off-Highway Junior Workforce USA by BFG.

Puck Klaassen and Rui Carneiro fly the flag for the G Rally Workforce of their OT3s and Mario Franco and Pedro Gonçalves shall be aiming for honours of their X-Raid-developed YXZ 1000Rs.

Can-Am Manufacturing unit Workforce appears for SSV success in new Maverick R

Eight of the ten registered SSV crews will drive Can-Ams and the Canadian producer will even give a aggressive debut to its new Maverick R. The machines had been permitted to run in an Experimental class in the direction of the top of 2024 however weren’t eligible for FIA Championships.

The Can-Am Manufacturing unit Workforce and the South Racing Can-Am Workforce shall be hoping to proceed their outstanding run of success on the Dakar. The American duo of Sara Worth and Sean Berriman begin because the favourites to say most W2RC factors within the new machine, whereas Fernando Alvarez (final yr’s winner of the FIA World Baja Cup’s SSV class) and Manuel Andújar will drive new Mavericks below the South Racing banner.

Registered competitors comes from a pair of Polaris RXRs within the arms of the Italian duo of Enrico Gaspari and Michele Cinotto, a South Racing Can-Am Maverick XRS Turbo RR for Diego Martinez and personal Can-Am entries for Claude Fournier, Alexandre Pinto, Carlos Vento and Roger Grouwels. Pinto gained the Highway to Dakar Problem on the Rally of Morocco again in October.

It’s fairly probably that the outright winner of the SSV part shall be a driver who shouldn’t be registered for the W2RC. A number of Dakar champion Fernando Lopez and American team-mate Hunter Miller wheel out a pair of manufacturing unit Maverick Rs, whereas former French biker Xavier de Soultrait has entered in a Polaris and the proficient Gerard Farrés and Sebastian Guayasamin drive a pair of Can-Am Maverick XRS Turbo RRs.

The route

The route for the forty seventh working of the world’s most well-known off-road occasion is foreboding, difficult and options a whole bunch of kilometres of sandy tracks and dune crossings.

The occasion relies out of a begin camp in Bisha within the southwest of the Kingdom for the primary time and finishes within the distant city of Shubaytah, deep within the Empty Quarter of Saudi’s Jap Province near the frontier with the UAE.

A 29km Prologue, close to Bisha, will decide the beginning order for the opening 412km Bisha loop stage on January 4th.

The primary a part of the race options the 48hr-chrono stage of 965km on January fifth and sixth and this leads in the direction of a Marathon stage with out service help between Al-Henakiya and Al-Ula, en path to the remainder day in Ha’il.

After the remainder day on January tenth, motion resumes with the sixth stage of 606km between Ha’il and Advert-Duwadimi and one other punishing 481km loop via the deserts round Advert-Duwadimi on January twelfth. 

The Dakar caravan then heads to the Saudi capital of Riyadh and on to Haradh for an additional two specials of 487km and 357km earlier than arriving in Shubaytah on January fifteenth after a brief run of 119km via the demanding dunes.

A closing sting within the tail would be the eleventh stage of 280km round Shubaytah on January sixteenth earlier than the ultimate Energy Selective Part types a part of the final stage of 134km that brings the survivors to the end celebrations in distant Shubaytah. Factors shall be awarded for the quickest three crews in every class on the brand new Energy Selective Part.

2025 Dakar Rally – main entries (W2RC registered solely):

Timetable of occasions